During his featherweight title defense at UFC 129, Jose Aldo did not appear to be himself against his opponent, Mark Hominick. While he did successfully defend his title, there was something slightly off about the champion on this night, as he looked r…
During his featherweight title defense at UFC 129, Jose Aldo did not appear to be himself against his opponent, Mark Hominick. While he did successfully defend his title, there was something slightly off about the champion on this night, as he looked relatively fatigued during the final round of the bout.
His head trainer at Nova Uniao, Andre Pederneiras, told Sherdog.com that the Brazilian was on antibiotics for an infection he received just days prior to the event.
“He suffered a cut on his toe [on April 23] and it got infected with bacteria,” Pederneiras said.
“He went through heavy medical treatment with antibiotics and anti-inflammatory pills from Sunday to Tuesday. He took the heavy dosage so that he wouldn’t have to take more drugs closer to the fight.”
The rumors surrounding his suspected illness only grew following his fight with Hominick, when his cornerman Marion Sandro was seen criticizing Aldo after he complained about wanting to take more antibiotics.
“Antibiotics wouldn’t have helped at all,” Sandro told Aldo. “You’re the champion, kid. F–k the antibiotics. Everything is OK. You fought well, smooth and composed.”
Aldo is likely to fight much sooner following his fourth title defense, as it is expected he will square off against unbeaten featherweight Chad Mendes at UFC 133. Although another challenger could emerge at UFC 131 when Kenny Florian will make his featherweight debut against Aldo’s teammate Diego Nunes.
Pederneiras said he is aware of the possibility that both Aldo and Nunes might have to fight each other, but the Nova Uniao trainer said their potential bout is not any of his concern.
“I think it will be against Chad Mendes,” Pederneiras says of Aldo’s future opponent.
“But Diego and everyone from Nova União knows that if they have to fight against each other, they will. I just don’t know how we would manage it, but they know they’re fighters and it’s their job. If the boss orders it, we’ll work on that situation. They’ll fight against whoever they’re matched with.”
The fast-moving mixed martial arts world offers fighters, fans and media no shortage of talking points every month. Like every other major sport, there’s plenty for the optimists and cynics to take away. Here’s a look at the good, the bad a…
The fast-moving mixed martial arts world offers fighters, fans and media no shortage of talking points every month. Like every other major sport, there’s plenty for the optimists and cynics to take away. Here’s a look at the good, the bad and the ugly for April 2011.
The Good
Little Guy Gold
April 30 will be remembered for UFC 129, a landmark UFC from the Rogers Centre in Toronto, Canada. The record-breaking attendance (55,724) and live-gate ($12.075 million) coupled with all fights being broadcast for the first time ever is an important milestones considering the sport’s origins as a blacked-out product that was hemorrhaging money.
Setting a precedent for successful stadium shows will surely propel the UFC and MMA forward just like the UFC Primetime hype series quietly finding its way on to ESPN 2. But the real victory of UFC 129 was the inaugural 145-pound title clash between champion Jose Aldo and Mark Hominick.
The first sub-155-pound title bout in UFC history delivered a Fight of the Night performance that outshined the headlining welterweight title tilt between Georges St-Pierre and Jake Shields. Aldo and Hominick were a difficult act to follow with their highly competitive bout, proving 2011 has seen (and announced) significantly stronger cards thanks to the arrival of featherweight and bantamweight divisions from the UFC’s sister promotion, the WEC.
Twenty-five tireless minutes pushed the champion to the limits as Hominick lived up to “The Machine” moniker, battling through an unsightly hematoma and the judges score cards for a valiant fifth-round comeback that put Aldo in danger.
With the UFC’s first sub-155-pound main event slated for UFC 132 on July 2 between UFC Bantamweight Champion Dominick Cruz and Urijah Faber, Aldo and Hominick’s co-main event scrap on the biggest UFC card set a high standard for any division. As the Octagon permeates mainstream sporting culture, the full-throttle fighting of lighter weight competitors—and the international markets like Mexico, Japan and China that can bring—will only accelerate the UFC’s upward trajectory.
Cross Promotion Possibilities
On April 9, Strikeforce Lightweight Gilbert Melendez and Strikeforce Welterweight Champion Nick Diaz successfully defended their belts with emphatic first-round finishes. The performances took on a life of their own because talk surrounding Strikeforce-UFC title versus title bouts was at an all-time high since UFC President Dana White was cageside, scouting the new talent available to him through Zuffa’s acquisition of the San Jose-based promotion.
Diaz’s name polluted post-UFC 129 talk as the next opponent for Georges St-Pierre in a champion versus champion welterweight super-fight. Melendez will be compared to the winner of UFC Lightweight Champion Frankie Edgar and Gray Maynard’s third contest as the UFC’s top 155-pounder later this month.
Alistair Overeem versus Cain Velasquez at heavyweight and now, mutual interest expressed in the media between UFC 205-pound kingpin Jon Jones and his Strikeforce counterpart Dan Henderson are dream fights driving the conversation in the MMA world.
The UFC featured champion versus champion bouts when Dan Henderson, a two-division PRIDE titleholder, returned to the UFC in late 2007–early 2008, but PRIDE had two other high-demand champions—Fedor Emelianenko and Takanori Gomi—that never challenged the UFC’s divisional kingpins.
Champion versus champion bouts in MMA have failed to materialize more often than not despite constant clamoring for them over the last decade due to lack of cross promotion. Expect the performances of champions in either promotion to continue drumming up the war cry from fans to seize this rare opportunity as the UFC’s monopolization of the elite talent in MMA phases out the need for such demand.
The Bad
Judging
This category can find its way onto this list every month, but April was a particularly unkind calendar on the scorecards.
Bellator Featherweight Champion Joe Warren’s Greco-Roman takedowns found him reversed before his non-title clash with Andre Galvao hit the mat on April 16. On the ground, Galvao’s jiu-jitsu dragged Warren through disadvantageous positions that were disregarded by judge Chuck Wolf when he gave Warren the round. The intricacies of jiu-jitsu were not the only point missed by Wolf as Galvao damaged Warren with knees in the second frame while thwarting all but one takedown attempt—again, the round went to Warren.
Real judging criteria would account for more than forward motion and takedowns, but unfortunately, fighters and fans are burdened with 30-27 scores that miss more than one point of what criteria should determine the outcome of an MMA fight.
Gegard Mousasi’s undeserved draw with Keith Jardine kept the former Strikeforce Light Heavyweight Champion from another win the week prior to Warren’s disputed (albeit not undeserved) decision. Mousasi should have emerged victorious on April 9, yet he walked away wondering, like so many other fighters have, why judges exist if they can’t make sound judgments.
It may be just another fight for judges randomly assigned by state athletic commissions, but it’s more than that to the fighters—it’s their career, and livelihood, and should be treated with that respect by those shaping its decisions.
Full Tilt Poker Shut Down
Bottom line: Anytime a major sponsor is cut out of MMA, fighters lose a much-needed revenue source.
The Ugly
The best way to dismiss concerns related to accepting a short notice bout is to make it short. On 17 days notice, UFC welterweight Jake Ellenberger agreed to meet Sean Pierson at UFC 129. A short, thudding left hook-straight right combo left Pierson defeated on the canvas—the only Canadian on the card to be knocked out in front of his home countrymen.
Danny Acosta is the lead writer at FIGHT! Magazine. Follow him on twitter.com/acostaislegend
UFC featherweight Mark Hominick was on The Fan 590 RadioMonday morning where he spoke with host Andrew Krystal about his gutsy fight at UFC 129 against Jose Aldo this past weekend.
According to “The Machine,” who says the gruesome hematoma he incurred during the bout was “merely a flesh wound,” the UFC brass were so impressed with his performance Saturday night that they have assured him that if he can put together a couple more wins, he’ll get another crack at the the promotion’s 145-pound strap.
Check out what Hominick had to say after the jump.
(“Hey you guys!!! Can I get a Baby Ruth?”)
UFC featherweight Mark Hominick was on The Fan 590 RadioMonday morning where he spoke with host Andrew Krystal about his gutsy fight at UFC 129 against Jose Aldo this past weekend.
According to “The Machine,” who says the gruesome hematoma he incurred during the bout was “merely a flesh wound,” the UFC brass were so impressed with his performance Saturday night that they have assured him that if he can put together a couple more wins, he’ll get another crack at the the promotion’s 145-pound strap.
Here’s what Hominick had to say about:
His disgusting hematoma:
“It was superficial. It looked a lot worse than it was, you know? I’ve got pair of black eyes but the swelling is down and it looked a lot worse than it was in the fight. I’m trying to avoid [seeing] some of [the photos from the fight]. Like I said, it was superficial and those hematomas…that’s just what happens in a fight. There’s swelling there and there’s nowhere for the swelling to go because you’re not cut or anything, so it just stockpiles there. I went to the hospital, got a CAT scan, everything was there, made sure nothing was broken, and nothing was broken and the CAT scan was completely fine. I put some ice on it and within two hours the swelling was gone. Both eyes are black and blue. A little swelling in the face but nothing serious. I’m wearing sunglasses and I can hide under them.”
Whether or not he thinks he was close to finishing the dominant champion:
“I think at the four minute mark he was waiting for that bell to ring. That’s just it. I was giving everything I had in my effort to finish the fight because I knew I was down. Besides the knockdown I believe it was pretty close throughout the fight. He just had heavy hands and any time he landed a clean punch he did damage and I think that was the difference in the fight. I hurt him early. A lot of people were talking about he was getting tired, he was tired I think because I hit him in the body. Even in the first round I hit him with a couple hard liver shots. That’s like my patented punch and I always attack the body on everybody. It takes your will to fight and I think that’s why he changed up the game plan and took me to the mat. It was a war and we got fight of the night for a reason. He did a lot of damage but like I said I inflicted a lot of damage on him and almost got the finish in the fifth round. Every couple of shots I landed a hard shot and I could just see it in his eyes. As much as he’s a champion and he wants to go out swinging, he was wanting that bell to ring. There’s no question. He was in there in survival mode as opposed to defending and attacking. He thought he had the fight in the bag at that point, so I think he was just trying to survive that last round.”
How many tickets he was asked to get by friends and family members:
“The numbers went down [of how many tickets I had to get] because they knew my hands were tied, but I know half of my high school was there for sure. It was pretty cool though. it was a big fight for all of them because all of them have known me since I was like five years old and to see where I came from… I’m from a town of 2,500 people. To be fighting in the biggest UFC [event] of all time for the world belt and to put on a fight like that, everyone was emotionally involved in that fight.”
The effect the raucous hometown crowd had on his performance:
“It was just a constant stream [of cheering], that’s what I was hearing. It just made me try that much harder. I think I proved there is no quit in me. I know I was supposed to go in there and I wasn’t supposed to make it out of the first round, but I was just trying to finish him. I wanted that belt so bad.”
What the UFC thought of his performance:
“Oh, they were thrilled. They were like, ‘Heal up and we want you back as soon as you can. In another two fights you will get another crack at the title.’ I know some of the things I have to work on to take him out. I don’t think he would be lining up to fight me to tell you the honest truth.”
Where he goes from here:
“[I’m going to] just take [on] a guy who’s maybe coming off of a win because I’m still in contention. I don’t think that fight puts me on the bottom of the pile. I’m still up there with the performance I put in. Jose Aldo hasn’t lost in five years. He’s never been in any type of trouble in any of his fights and I almost finished him. I took him to his limits. People know that I’m for real and I just have to go out there and prove it again. Honestly, I think 30 seconds more and I could have finished the fight. I wasn’t stopping and he was fading. But again, the bell rang and he won, so I have to go back to the drawing board and come back stronger.”
(Mendes thinks he can expose Aldo on the ground using his wrestling prowess)
Number one UFC featherweight contender Chad Mendes watched Jose Aldo grind out a decision win over Mark Hominick live at the Rogers Centre in Toronto and walked away from the event with the confidence that he can beat the previously thought invincible UFC featherweight champion.
Mendes told ESPN’s Brett Okamoto yesterday that he isn’t buying the excuse that the Aldo was sick going into the bout or that the strain of cutting weight after adding muscle the past several months left him in a weakened state strength and conditioning-wise.
(Mendes thinks he can expose Aldo on the ground using his wrestling prowess)
Number one UFC featherweight contender Chad Mendes watched Jose Aldo grind out a decision win over Mark Hominick live at the Rogers Centre in Toronto and walked away from the event with the confidence that he can beat the previously thought invincible UFC featherweight champion.
Mendes told ESPN’s Brett Okamoto yesterday that he isn’t buying the excuse that the Aldo was sick going into the bout or that the strain of cutting weight after adding muscle the past several months left him in a weakened state strength and conditioning-wise.
“The weight cut might have been part of it but I’m sticking with it’s a completely different kind of conditioning when you’re on the ground. His wrestling and grappling conditioning is not the same as his standup conditioning,” Mendes explained. “Being explosive on the feet is different than grappling, with the squeezing and pushing and pulling. It’s different on your muscles. We haven’t seen him on the ground a lot and I think that played a part in how tired he looked.”
The morale boost the fight gave him will be a great springboard for Mendes to begin camp for his eventual clash with Aldo at a yet-to-be-determined date.
“I just remember thinking, ‘Wow. This isn’t what I thought it was going to be,’” Mendes recalled. “Honestly, it’s what I wanted to see, though. We haven’t seen anybody get on top of him or him do much grappling.That’s really the only place I wanted to see this guy and getting to see it was a huge confidence booster for me.”
UFC president Dana White announced during the post-fight press conference Saturday night that Mendes is likely next in line for a shot at the belt, but “Money” reveals that his shot has been secured for a while.
“My manager started talking to Dana [White] about this about a month ago,” Mendes said. “I was just telling somebody I can’t believe it’s already here – fighting for a UFC world title. I’ve only been fighting for less than three years. It’s awesome. I’m pumped.”
(Weirdest part is, the Portuguese language has no phrase that means “dress shoes.”)
Just one of the many, many problems inherent in ranking MMA’s top “pound-for-pound” fighters – aside from the obvious fact these lists are 100 percent fantasy-based and therefore flatly ridiculous to begin with — is that a lot of people can’t even agree what the phrase “pound-for-pound” actually means. Does it simply provide a method for comparing the best fighters in the world across different classes? Does it purport to measure a fighter’s dominance relative to his size? Does it envision a bizzaro world where everyone is the same height and weight? And if so, does a 135-pound Fedor Emelianenko still have that ribbon of fat around his gut? Fuck if we know.
Fact is, pound-for-pound lists are really just a study in speculative fiction. Rather than trying to rank a bunch of fighters who will never actually fight we’d probably be better off writing a sprawling, dystopian novel presupposing that the Nazis won WWII, Custer didn’t die at the Little Bighorn and that during the summer of 1985 a 27-year-old Dan Severn accidentally stepped on a butterfly during his morning jog through Ann Arbor, setting off a chain reaction that caused Jon Jones never to be born at all. I guess what we’re trying to say is, things are about to get real theoretical up in this bitch. Like, comically subjective and shit.
Still, even if we can’t claim to know exactly what these rankings are trying to achieve, we do know one thing: Our carefully cultivated demographic information tells us you motherfuckers loves you some lists. And in that, we must oblige …
(Weirdest part is, the Portuguese language doesn’t even have a phrase that means “dress shoes.”)
Just one of the many, many problems inherent in ranking MMA’s top “pound-for-pound” fighters – aside from the obvious fact these lists are 100 percent fantasy-based and therefore flatly ridiculous to begin with — is that a lot of people can’t even agree what the phrase “pound-for-pound” actually means. Does it simply provide a method for comparing the best fighters in the world across different classes? Does it purport to measure a fighter’s dominance relative to his size? Does it envision a bizzaro world where everyone is the same height and weight? And if so, does a 135-pound Fedor Emelianenko still have that ribbon of fat around his gut? Fuck if we know.
Fact is, pound-for-pound lists are really just a study in speculative fiction. Rather than trying to rank a bunch of fighters who will never actually fight we’d probably be better off writing a sprawling, dystopian novel presupposing that the Nazis won WWII, Custer didn’t die at the Little Bighorn and that during the summer of 1985 a 27-year-old Dan Severn accidentally stepped on a butterfly during his morning jog through Ann Arbor, setting off a chain reaction that caused Jon Jones never to be born at all. I guess what we’re trying to say is, things are about to get real theoretical up in this bitch. Like, comically subjective and shit.
Still, even if we can’t claim to know exactly what these rankings are trying to achieve, we do know one thing: Our carefully cultivated demographic information tells us you motherfuckers loves you some lists. And in that, we must oblige …
Ben Goldstein:
1. Anderson Silva: All the easy analogies have been beaten to death, so what can you really say about Anderson Silva except that he’s a lion playing among wildebeests? It’s not just athleticism, aptitude, and creativity — Silva possesses the kind of extra-dimensional vision usually reserved for deaf composers and chess savants. When it comes to fighting, he can do literally anything.
2. Georges St. Pierre: Let’s be frank — GSP’s technical perfection is not always a thrill to watch, and his five-rounder against Jake Shields nearly ruined UFC 129. But the level of dominance he’s displayed against the UFC’s welterweight elite over the last four years has been astounding. You have to give it up for a guy who can take the fight wherever he wants it to go, 100 percent of the time.
3. Jose Aldo: I actually liked seeing Aldo get beat up a little bit by Mark Hominick; adversity is what makes a legend. Now that he’s survived that test, I have no doubt he’ll resume his slash-and-burn through the contender list at 145, starting with Chad Mendes, then (fingers crossed) moving on to Kenny Florian.
4. Jon Jones: The present and the future of MMA. His performances are already as impressively superhuman as Anderson Silva’s. All he needs is the title reign — and maybe, one day, a run at heavyweight.
5. Dominick Cruz: A complete and uniquely talented champion who has left some of the best bantamweights in the sport licking their wounds and scratching their heads. A win over Urijah Faber at UFC 132 in July would finally get him over with casual fans, while avenging his only loss in 18 fights.
Chad Dundas:
1. Jon Jones: Jonny Bones is 23 years old, has had fewer than 10 fights in the UFC, isn’t even done physically maturing yet and already, nobody in the world wants to fight him. That includes at least one guy on this list and that’s good enough for me.
2. Georges St. Pierre: All St. Pierre has done during the last three and a half years is outthink, outperform and outclass every opponent the UFC could find to put in the cage with him. Is it his fault he competes in the only sport in the world where that’s not good enough for some people?
3. Anderson Silva: Silva is so good that half the time it looks like he’s not even really trying. I guess that’s a problem for everybody not named Anderson Silva.
4. Dominick Cruz: One of the most elusive and unorthodox fighters in the sport, Cruz must be a nightmare to prepare for. Just 25 years old, as long as his body doesn’t come apart on him, he could be champ for a while.
5. Jose Aldo: Aldo may have shown his mettle in gutting one out over Hominick, but he didn’t exactly come away looking like a pound-for-pound great. I’m willing to chalk it up to sickness for now, but I’ll need to see a return to form if I’m going to justify keeping him on this list at the expense of guys like Frankie Edgar, Gilbert Melendez and Cain Velasquez next time. Wait, we are going to do this again at some point … right?
Mike Russell:
1. Anderson Silva: Besides the four round spanking he received from Chael Sonnen last year, no opponent has been able to touch “The Spider” the past few years. He’s the reason Georges St. Pierre is reluctant to move up to 185 and why Jon Jones will likely change his tune about fighting friends if Silva decides to move up to light heavyweight.
2. Georges St-Pierre: His only loss of the past six years came at the hands of Matt Serra, who loses 9.995 times out of 10 to GSP under normal circumstances. The problem is, the loss made him revert to a more careful (read, boring) style that has turned many fans off of watching his fights. It’s tough to argue against him being on this list, as he is as dominant a fighter as you’ll find, but if this was the top most exciting fighters in the game he would be somewhere at the bottom, ahead of Jake Shields and Jon Fitch.
3. Jon Jones: Another few wins over top competition could move Jones ahead of St-Pierre on the list, but considering that the UFC’s light heavyweight strap is becoming as cursed as its heavyweight one (in the past nine championship bouts it has been won by seven different men), the odds of him remaining champion are stacked against him.
4. Jose Aldo: Some people think that Aldo’s hard-fought win over Hominick should drop him in the pound-for-pound rankings. I think it should elevate Hominick up a few slots. The fight proved that Aldo can fight through adversity to win and although he didn’t look dominant in doing it, the same can also be said for the top two on this list at times during their respective careers.
5. Frankie Edgar: If Edgar can definitively beat Gray Maynard in their rubber match, nobody will argue that he deserves to be on this list. If he wins, I’d like to see him take on Gilbert Melendez next, as I think “El Nino” could shake things up a bit in the UFC’s lightweight class and in these rankings.
Honorable mentions: Gilbert Melendez, Cain Velasquez, Dominick Cruz, Nick Diaz.
Georges St-Pierre met Jake Shields on Saturday, April 30 at UFC 129 and has been the case in many of his title defenses as of late, the UFC welterweight champion exploited the weakness in his opponent’s game to retain his UFC title.Going into the fi…
Georges St-Pierre met Jake Shields on Saturday, April 30 at UFC 129 and has been the case in many of his title defenses as of late, the UFC welterweight champion exploited the weakness in his opponent’s game to retain his UFC title.
Going into the fight, the knock on Shields had been his weak striking game, which St-Pierre used to his advantage, keeping the fight standing for the full five rounds.
The champion was able to take advantage of that weakness, but he did not walk away without sustaining some damage.
According to the CompuStrike stats, Shields landed 63 of 318 arm strikes he threw, leaving the champion with a bloodied face as well as a damaged left eye. The injury to the eye, which appeared to come from an eye poke from Shields, left St-Pierre unable to see from that eye for much of the fourth and fifth rounds.
In addition to bloodying the champion, Shields was able to accomplish something that no one else had done for 30 straight rounds, and that was take a round from the champion. The scorecards gave the unanimous decision victory to St-Pierre 50-45, 48-47, 48-47.
Following the fight, St-Pierre, speaking with UFC commentator Joe Rogan apologized for his performance, “I can’t see with my left eye right now. I just see a blur. I’m sorry to the fans. I wanted to make it a knockout or submission.”
The fight marked the sixth title defense for St-Pierre.
During his featherweight title defense at UFC 129, Jose Aldo did not appear to be himself against his opponent, Mark Hominick. While he did successfully defend his title, there was something slightly off about the champion on this night, as he looked relatively fatigued during the final round of the bout. 
